The Last Noel

The Last Noel 

 

(In Memory of Cheri Denise)

 

Not that she died,

But that her angels

Perished in the fray,

 

While they yet had

Ambition and the will

To run a cruel gauntlet

 

In their way

 

You must have grinned

When you deceived my child

 

With naught but

Honied poison

For her mind!

 

And maybe it was something done in jest

To tap a sense of humor in your kind

 

But even fiendish wit has flaws galore,

For why entice an innocent to flame,

When little is the merit of a trick

That brings upon the trickster

 

Only shame!

 

 

So, jest ‘tis not, nor joke - but irony,

That we fall in our rawness to a blight

Without a reason proffered for our pains

In passing but from darkness into night.

 

-Christmas Eve 1961-

 

Yet, how the snowflakes fairly swell,

Floating o’er our last Noel!

 

They are lighter than the air,

 

 Glowing here

And gleaming there

 

They are many,

None the same;

 

They are heaven’s ice aflame

 

They are angels, all in white �"

Some are spirit, all are light.

 

-P-

 

I do not think that the achievement of happiness has been a realistic goal for me. I have experienced all of life’s major stages and cannot honestly say that any of them involved sustained happiness. I was happy (almost insanely so) for a few moments when it snowed on Christmas Eve, 1961, and I was on top of the world for several hours when I received some good news about my health last Friday - but neither of those feelings lasted, nor did any other happiness I have ever enjoyed. Possibly, I was happy for an entire day.

 

So, I was thinking about the death of my niece, and how desperately she sought to extend her time on the physical plane during the last year of her life, given that she was a chronic alcoholic who experienced only the misery that attends bi-polar disorder and the progressively awful symptoms of cirrhosis of the liver. Perhaps, she was like me: I have always been willing to engage a challenge that comes before me, whether or not I am ready. I love to try and derive a sense of affirmation from making the effort, especially if the odds are stacked against me. It is almost as if I am hopelessly in love with a test proctor. I may be among her worst students, but I am determined to be her pet, and I will sacrifice anything toward that end.